By Robert Steward

SACRAMENTO–

Fresh off a 2-6 road trip in which the Sacramento Kings allowed an average of 115 points a game and 52% shooting from the floor over the last 7 games, they hosted the Eastern Conference-leading Atlanta Hawks tonight at Sleep Train Arena. It was quite the entertaining game but, as has been the case too many times this season, the Kings came up short in the end, losing to the Hawks, 110-103. The Hawks were playing without NBA 3-point leader Kyle Korver, who has hit 50.4% from beyond the arc this season. Korver suffered a broken nose Sunday night during the Hawks’ win over the Los Angeles Lakers and will miss at least 3 games. One week ago Korver had torched the Kings for 6 three-pointers, leading Atlanta to a franchise-record 20 trey’s in routing the Kings, 130-105, in Atlanta. Sacramento was also playing short-handed, as Rudy Gay sat out with a left patellar tendon strain.

In what became a familiar theme throughout the game, the Kings opened by missing 3 layups in the first minute of play. Ben McLemore picked up two quick fouls and left the game at 9:41. The Kings made only their second bucket of the quarter at the 8:56 mark, a three by Ray McCallum to make it 6-5, Atlanta, before the teams began to pick things up a bit. DeMarcus Cousins began attacking the basket with regularity, making some layups in the low post and getting to the free throw line. After a Nik Stauskas trey, the Kings led, 29-23, with 34 seconds left. However, Atlanta, who kept getting second chances at the basket following their own missed shots, answered back with a quick layup by Dennis Schroder and following a Kings miss, the Hawks’ Shelvin Mack hit a 3 at the horn to cut the Kings lead to 29-28 after the first quarter.

The second quarter saw both teams going back and forth for the first 5 minutes of the quarter. However, with the score tied at 41 with 6:35 left in the half following a jumper by Cousins, the Kings went cold and proceeded to miss their next 7 shots, allowing the Hawks to build a 50-41 lead until Cousins finally broke the scoring drought with a power baseline dunk with 2:15 left. Cousins had been shaken up a bit following a hard offensive charge call on Atlanta’s DeMarre Carroll with 5:45 left, staying on the floor for a few minutes but came back on the court following a timeout after the foul. The Kings trailed at the half, 54-47. Atlanta shot 46% from the floor in the first half, hitting 5 of 12 from 3-point land. Sacramento tailed off in the 2nd quarter and was only shooting 41% from the floor at the break, although they were 5 of 11 from beyond the arc. Cousins had 14 points and 9 rebounds at halftime, while Atlanta had balanced scoring from Jeff Teague, who had 11 points, and Paul Millsap with 10. Mack and Carroll both had 8 for the Hawks.

Both teams opened the 3rd quarter playing subpar, the Kings missing 4 of their first 5 shots, while the Hawks missed 5 of their first 6, including 3 in a row from behind the 3-point line. The Kings also got sloppy and turned the ball over repeatedly. Despite the turnovers, the Kings only trailed, 57-52, with 8:37 left in the 3rd. It was at this point that Atlanta went on an 11-4 run over the next two and a half minutes to take their biggest lead up to that point at 68-56, forcing the Kings to call a timeout with 6:07 left in the quarter. The Hawks got to the foul line time and time again in the 3rd, hitting 9 of 12 from the charity stripe. But Sacramento did not roll over that easily. Sparked by Jason Thompson and Andre Miller coming off the bench, the Kings fought back and whittled what was once a 13-point Atlanta lead at 73-60 down to 80-76 before Atlanta scored with 20 seconds left to finish the quarter leading 82-76. Thompson scored 8 points in the quarter but the Kings turned it over 9 times in the 3rd.

As the 4th quarter unfolded, the Kings stayed close, trimming the lead on 4 different occasions to two points, despite DeMarcus Cousins picking up his 5th foul with 7:23 left and having to exit the game. Sacramento only trailed 90-88 at the 6:33 mark and had hit 6 of their first 8 shots in the quarter. Thompson and Miller continued to spark the Kings, who cut the lead to 1, at 96-95, following a Miller jumper, which forced the Hawks to call timeout with 3:00 left to go. It was still a one-point Hawks lead, 100-99, when Miller had a chance to give the Kings their first lead since 8:42 left in the 2nd quarter but missed his first shot of the game with 1:28 left. The Hawks countered with a three by Kent Bazemore at 1:06 to push the lead up to 103-99. Atlanta proceeded to put the game away by hitting 5 of 6 free throws in the final 23 seconds.

Atlanta’s balanced scoring continued throughout the game. 4 of the Hawks starters finished in double figures, led by Jeff Teague with 23 points, Millsap had 19, Carroll scored 16, and Bazemore finished with 11. Mack and Schroder came off the bench to score 14 and 10, respectively. Even without Korver, the Hawks still launched 31 three-pointers, hitting 12. Atlanta finished at 45% from the floor. The Kings came alive in the 4th, hitting 10 of 17 from the floor. Jason Thompson had a perfect game, hitting all 7 of his shots from the floor and 4 of 4 from the free-throw line. He finished with 18 points off the bench, while Miller had 16 off the bench on 6 of 7 from the floor. Cousins led the Kings with 20 points and 13 rebounds. Omri Casspi had 16, McLemore added 11 before fouling out with 23 seconds left, and McCallum chipped in with 10. The Kings finished at 47% shooting from the floor, including 7 of 20 from beyond the arc, but had 20 turnovers for the game, which proved too difficult to overcome.

Next up for the Kings will be the Los Angeles Clippers when they visit on Wednesday night at 7pm.